but for ...とは 意味・読み方・使い方

前置詞

but for

1. Except, except for; save for; not counting; were it not for; had it not been for.

   I’d’ve attended but for the fact that the train was late.

   • c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]:

     I once did lend my body for his wealth,
     Which, but for him that had your husband's ring,
     Had quite miscarried: […]

   • 1847 October 16, Currer Bell [pseudonym; Charlotte Brontë], Jane Eyre. An Autobiography. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Smith, Elder, and Co., […], →OCLC:

     She had a woman to take care of her called Mrs Poole — an able woman in her line, and very trustworthy, but for one fault — a fault common to a deal of them nurses and matrons — she kept a bottle of gin by her, and now and then took a drop over-much.

   • 1880, Mark Twain, A Tramp Abroad:

     But for that beneficent drug, not one of those men would have slept a moment during that fearful night.

   • 1886 January 5, Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., →OCLC:

     In the whole extent of the house, which but for the old woman remained otherwise empty, Mr. Hyde had only used a couple of rooms

   • 1945 March and April, “Higher speeds”, in Railway Magazine, page 67:

     In reconditioning existing locomotives, carriages and wagons, it is intended to replace obsolete types which would have been scrapped but for the war and to embody the latest scientific improvements.

   • 1992, Najīb Maḥfūẓ, Sugar Street, page 48:

     But for the stinging cold of January, this Casanova would not have taken shelter behind the coffeehouse window, […] .

2. despite; in spite of